


Patching Things Up

by elviaprose



Category: David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Victorian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-03 01:25:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19453489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elviaprose/pseuds/elviaprose
Summary: Written for the following corsetsandlemons prompt (though I didn't quite manage to post it before the challenge closed): After David loses his first fight with the butcher, Uriah patches him up and either teaches him how to beat the shit out of his opponent or what bear grease is *really* for. (Or both--both is good.)





	Patching Things Up

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to x_los for the beta!

The butcher’s boy had defeated me soundly, and I bore the marks to prove it. It was very bad all round, for I was very proud, but the worst of it all was that Agnes finding out should follow. Oh, how I blushed beneath my bruises at the very thought that my dear sister would see me in such a brutish and bloodied state. Under Agnes’s eye, I should feel as base as one of Caesar’s senators, hands crimson to the elbow. I did not repent of having challenged the butcher’s boy--he had mocked the honor of my school and my fellows, and as their head boy it was my office to defy him for it. In my young eyes, it was my vanquishment that made the thing so dishonorable. If I could only have set him down powerfully, and been a sacrificer but not a butcher (as Brutus would have put it)! As events had transpired, it was I who had been butchered, and no mistaking it.

I opened the door to Mister Wickfield’s house as quietly as I could, for my object was to make myself decent without attracting notice. Though there was nothing to be done about the swelling around my nose or the bruise beneath my eye, I could clean the blood from my face, at least. I really thought I had kept entirely silent. And yet I had not taken ten steps before Uriah Heep emerged from his little turret office to stand before me, wringing his long, lank hands in distress.

“Master Copperfield!” he cried. “I wondered who had come in so quiet! Look at the state of you--heavens---your face, Master Copperfield,” he said, the last of this exclamation punctuated with great writhes of his body. He took a step towards me. “Whatever’s happened? Not a fight? You haven’t a broken a tooth or any bone, have you?” He asked. 

It surprised me that he should take such an interest.

“No, it’s not so bad as it looks, Uriah,” I told him stiffly. “Never mind how it happened. It’s really of no consequence, I assure you.”

Uriah looked at me with his flat red eyes. They were very shrewd, and I could see that I might as well have admitted to the fight. He knew full well that if it had been anything else--for instance, had I been thrown bodily by a coach that had lost its coachmen--I should have told him without hesitation.

“You’ll forgive me, Master Copperfield, but, umbly, it would be a kindness to all if you’d be more careful of that face of yours--it is such a handsome one, and such a happiness and a comfort, as much as any fine painting. I have said to mother often enough, what a pity it is that father never saw how handsomely Master Copperfield’s grown up.” 

It really was such a curious thing to say, and I could not help but think that he seemed to mean it in earnest. He often fawned to hide his malice, and I thought he must do so now, for his face and eyes were very hard as he spoke--only, now that malice seemed to be for my carelessness with myself. To say such things to his mother--if he truly did--seemed a great liberty. I thought I really ought not to be of such consequence to anyone of the Heep household. Though he could have denied it up and down and been well justified, I felt he spoke of me almost as if I were his property.

“That’s kind of you,” I said uncomfortably. “But before I make any such promises not to get into any more scrapes, I ought to clean myself up.”

“Oh, let me help,” he said quickly, and though I never would have thought it likely, making the offer actually seemed to bring a flush to his face. 

That began to put things in another light to me. I had known boys to fall into fascinations with each other at school, and had experienced such a thing--just once--myself. I wondered whether Uriah might have come to have such an interest without my knowing it. I really had not thought he liked me at all. I was greatly flattered to think I could strike him so, and felt my embarrassment lighten a little--though I tried not to presume to know his feelings, or to take things for other than what they were. 

He put a hand very lightly on my back and began guiding me towards the kitchen. “You’ll want help heating up a bath. There ain’t much work I must do for Wickfield today, and the Lord don’t like us to be idle, you know.” 

“But you must be busy. What about your own studies? You are articled now, aren’t you?” I said, and I confess I said it partly to see if it should affect him to be asked after. But I also found I really should like to know if he had taken his articles. I realized that he and I had not spoken of anything of substance in some time. 

“That’s as well in hand as may be for an umble person,” he said. “Yes, I des-say it’s pretty well in hand, for though I have nothing much to recommend me when it comes to being a quick study, I’ve been at it ten year now, tooth and nail.”

“So you have!” I said, a little surprised to realize it had been so long. Uriah had never seemed to like me to compliment him, and so I said no more, but I privately thought that he must have made himself quite an impressive authority on the law. Ten years was a long span indeed (it seemed especially so to me then, in my youth), and Uriah was not one to be idle, if there was anything in his interest still to be done. Nor was he one to boast falsely on any point (except, perhaps, his humility). If he said he had things pretty well in hand, what he surely meant was that he had the law grasped tight in both fists. I had not, myself, begun in any career at all, and I admit I felt a little envious.

We were already halfway to the kitchen. I wondered if there had been anything to change his feelings towards me, or if he had always liked me, and then I came back to wondering if he even liked me now. I felt a little giddy with wondering so much--though I thought some of the spinning of my head might have been the result of the several knocks I had taken.

The cook was not in the kitchen, and so we had the room to ourselves. Uriah started the water heating before I could think to do it.

“You just sit down at the table, Master Copperfield,” he said, (for the kitchen held a small wooden one), “and I’ll fetch a shirt for you from your room while the water warms up, shall I? Less chance of you running into--Somebody, I should think,” he said, insinuatingly.

“I’d be much obliged,” I replied, trying to pretend I didn’t know what he was talking about.

Uriah was a while coming back--longer than I should have expected--and as the water grew hot I began to worry that he had run across either Somebody or Wickfield and had been obliged to explain himself. 

When he returned he assured me that he had seen no one and that no one had seen him. He had thought to bring my tin of bear grease down as well, so that I could put my hair to rights. I felt charmed that he had taken this extra effort to please me. He smiled back, in that strange unsmiling way of his, where his lips stretched his face, but did not curve upwards.

He tested the water with a finger. “That’s ready, don’t you think?” 

I stripped off and got into the tub. Uriah kept his eyes down, and yet I felt that he was looking at me. Feeling all too aware of all of the unbecoming bruises I sported (I wanted him to be impressed with me, and felt I could not be very impressive in such a state), I began straightaway to scrub quite vigorously, trying not to wince as I did so.

“Goodness, Master Copperfield!” Uriah said quietly. “There’s no need to be in such a hurry, is there? What’s five minutes more, to spare your bruises?”

I slowed my pace, thinking that if he really was pleased to be in my company, which he seemed to be, I didn’t want to hurry, regardless of whether I looked silly. I found myself remembering how, when I was still a boy, I had always felt strangely drawn to visit him in his little office. I felt that attraction to his company again, now. The feeling sat hotter in my breast than before, more painful and more pleasurable. 

“If I may offer an umble piece of advice, Master Copperfield? Whoever it is you’ve come to blows with, it don’t matter how strong he is. He’ll have one fist that he can hit with,” Uriah said, still looking down, and yet also at me, “and if you should keep eyes on that arm and keep clear of it, you won’t have much to worry about from the other.”

“Really?” I said. “How did you come to know that? I don’t imagine it was from old Tidd,”

“Oh, around and about,” he said, ”but I do hope you’ll credit it, as it may do you a deal of good--and me too, for I meant what I said.”

“It seems good advice,” I told him, still finding his attitude towards me quite difficult to understand. I had finished washing off, and rose from the water. Uriah’s eyes seemed to be absolutely everywhere else in the room, yet still on me. After making the most polite of requests to be allowed to do it, he began to help me to dry off, and then to put on my shirt, being very careful of me. My shirt was nearly fully on, but not yet buttoned, when he said, in what amounted to a whisper:

“Master Copperfield, you do look a sight.”

“I’m sure I do,” I said, with a little more evident regret than I had intended. Though I sensed that even now he liked to look at me, I wanted very much to be in better condition to be admired by him--I could not have desired it more, I think, if Uriah were the prettiest girl in England. His eyes were so strange, and his touch had always put me through such sensations. He was grave in his aspect, and yet he was not sober and dull (like Adams, I thought traitorously). He had a little devilishness about him, and though he rarely smiled, he always spoke with such relish--as though all he said was said to a purpose, and one that pleased him. I liked the look of him--all strange angles and expressions. 

“Do you ever wonder,” Master Copperfield, he said, still very quietly, “what life should be to you if you were not so handsome as you are? You have always been too pretty by half to so much as think of giving a kiss to the likes of me--I am well aware of it. But if you weren’t--maybe you would?”

His hands were on my collar, very light and gentle.

“I’ll gladly kiss you now, be my looks what they may. Only,” said I, a little reproachfully, a little coyly, “I never thought you liked me.” I was all too aware of the bruise across my face, burning hot and ugly. And yet I felt, beneath his stare, like a pretty fairy. I wanted to sulk and be soothed, tease and be indulged by him, and I felt that I would be, if I tried it.

Uriah looked for all the world like a dog that had caught his first rat, and given himself the start of his life in doing it. He seemed positively at the limit of his wits--though the moment did not last long. “Will you really?” he said, a little suspiciously.“Oh, I _do_ like you Master Copperfield. I’ve always overflowed towards you. Only, it is awfully hard sometimes to forgive you for liking me so little.”

I laughed. “That has been exactly my quarrel with you. I suppose we must make peace, then. Go on and kiss me, if you’d really like it so well as all that.” 

He did not smile in return, but pressed his lips to mine softly.

A pleasant shock went through me when he did it. I confess, I had not expected to feel quite so much from it, for it was such an ordinary gesture, such as friends or relations might exchange. 

“Thank you, Copperfield,” he said, and I thought he nearly frowned, with his browless forehead. I could see that his narrow chest rose and fell hard. 

His eyes came up and fixed fully on me, then, and what I saw in them, and in his face, was like no expression I had ever seen before. It was a revelation to me, but not quite a shock, for I felt it was precisely how he _should_ have looked, so perfectly did it accord with all that he was and all he could be. The mask he wore had fallen, and I knew him as I had never known him before. He wanted me. Oh, how he wanted me. Far beyond my experience of what one boy might look for from another, far beyond what was decent. I knew, before he spoke, what he aimed at--in nature if not in form--and, God help me, I surely would have given it even if he had not asked. “You must tell me if I may do anything else more than kiss you, for if I may, I will,” said he.

“If you’d like,” I said, swallowing around a very dry throat. “Whatever you should like, Uriah.”

I should like to meet the virtuous soul who was once looked upon as Uriah looked at me, and withstood it. I am certain such a look has, in the course of history, turned many a loyal wife to an adulteress. I consider myself fortunate that I was young, and my heart yet unpromised. 

Uriah flushed deeper than he had before, upon hearing this answer from me. I liked that his feeling for me could make him color. I found it wonderful that Uriah could be so ordinary, and yet at once nearly monstrous in all he did--including love me. For that was the secret of the look I had seen, the look that had overpowered me: it was a terrible, hungry look, but it was also fond, and sweet as sugar, all at once.

“Come into the cellar then,” he said, “where we can be private about it.” 

The cellar door was only paces away, and Uriah hurried to it and pulled it open in a trice. He motioned me down, but took a moment himself before following me down the ladder. As I descended alone, I shuddered a little, at both the cold and the strangeness of our circumstances. I felt a little frightened--of Uriah, of what we were about to do. Then door closed over us, and I heard him come down the ladder, and then there we stood together in the quiet dark, among the preserves. It seemed, then, the right place to be together with Uriah. It seemed like him, that cellar. Cluttered and closed in and clammy, yet in its own way wonderful, a place of provision and secret stores: strange, rich jams and jellies, dried herbs and meats, and Lord knows what else, waiting to be remembered and tasted. There was very little light to see by, but I could see the shapes of things, dim outlines. I wished I could see him, and also, I confess, wished he could admire me more, but I was glad, too, that I could be a little less conscious of myself. As if it were not enough of an indignity to bear the marks of my fight all over my body, I was quite absurdly still without my trousers.

I reached for him and he clutched at me, gasping.

His hand found the tenderest flesh I possessed and squeezed hard. I let out a strangled cry and clung to him. 

“I’d never come out of here, if I could,” he muttered, and kissed the side of my face. His hands rifled all over me--he seemed to remember exactly where I was bruised. Largely he avoided those places, but sometimes he would let his fingers rest where I had been hurt, pressing ever so slightly. 

He continued stroking me until I leaned on him to stay upright.

“I am about to ask a prying question, Master Copperfield,” he said. “I beg your pardon for it. Have you ever had a finger up your arse?”

“Uriah!” I cried. I could feel his body shaking with laughter. 

“Oh, lord, you’re so lovely Master Copperfield,” he said. I loved to be complimented by him, I loved it terribly. 

“Go on and do it,” I said wildly. “Do anything wicked.”

Uriah let out a choked sound. He had brought my bear grease down with him--I could tell by the sound of it opening--and he used it to make one of his long fingers slick. He stroked with his palm over my arse and then brushed his finger gently up and down along a place that was not quite inside me, but yet was so near to it that all I could think of was that soon he would do it. I thought of it over and over again, and wanted it desperately, even as those touches of his just on their own set me trembling. Finally, he began to press that finger in, ever so slowly. I bit my lip very hard to keep quiet. At least, I thought, I was battered enough that any injury I did myself in these strange exertions would not be noticed or remarked on. 

Each motion he made sent hot and cold all through me. I found I had forgotten to bite my lip and was whimpering softly against him--and that he was shushing me and soothing me. Finally, his finger was deep inside me. I cried his name over and over, as he worked that finger in and out. After a little time of that, the pleasure wracked me too hard for me to bear it much longer, and I told him so. He did not stop instantly, but rather began stroking my cock once more, and it only took a few moments of that before my enjoyment peaked. It was like nothing I had ever felt before. 

“That’s a pretty good trick, ain’t it?” He muttered into my ear.

“Have you done it often?” I asked, perhaps a little jealously.

“I wouldn’t say so often as _often_. And never with anybody but the two of us as stand here now,” he replied. He held me to him as he spoke, his hand going again over my arse--and quite tenderly, too.

Though I had more than seldom--especially of late--given in to the temptation to relieve myself of my own desires with the solitary vice, I confess that it had never so much as occurred to me to subject myself to anything so devilish. It seemed of altogether a different order. It struck me that the more Uriah humbled himself, the more his soul twisted and turned and stretched and sought strange pleasures. Private, secret enjoyments that were all the more to be enjoyed for being forbidden. And he had now, it seemed, pulled me down into the dark with him, and I was to be given what delights he had found, as one whom he liked. I did not mind any of this in him--in fact, far from minding his perversity, I quite liked it, revealed to me as it had been so intimately. I said nothing, but stroked my hand over the nape of his neck, which made him shudder.

“Now, what will you do for me, Master Copperfield?” he asked me. I quite liked this way of putting it, I do confess, and it gave a hard spur to my ambition to please him. I wanted to go with him deeper into the damp dark where he liked to dwell than he had even taken himself. I positively trembled with eagerness to pull him down where he wanted to go, to offer him better and sweeter pleasures than he could find alone. It occurred to me that though Uriah often seemed he might confess to having a conger eel for a cousin, or even for a brother, he could not double himself quite in half. Thus I might kiss and lick and suck his cock, and nobody else should ever have done it. I could not bear to name the deed, and so I simply dropped down to the floor, fumbled his trousers around his ankles, and touched my lips to him there. I could feel that his cock was hard and swollen already--and it seemed very long and large--though I did not explore its full length and so I had only a half formed sense of it. 

My bare legs grew dirty from the earthen floor, and kneeling was quite uncomfortable, but I didn’t mind in the least. I began to kiss and lick and sometimes suck a little, and by the sounds he made, I could tell I had found just the thing to do. Had I trounced the butcher’s boy twice over, I should not have felt prouder. I was absolutely delighted with both Uriah and myself--sinfully so. 

“Oh, _Copperfield_ ,” he muttered, and then, more urgently, “Master Copperfield, you had better put me into your mouth right quick or I’ll make an awful mess of you.” I took his advice, though such was my depravity that I considered letting that mess be made. It was only the shreds of my practicality that stopped me doing it (for it would have been difficult for me to get myself clean enough to walk safely through the house). I thought he might like it, and I was really determined to do anything he might like. For my own part, I had shuddered with pleasure when he cupped his sweating palm against my cheek, and I thought how much better still it would be to be so damply ruined as _that_. At first, I did not get him very far into my mouth, and I held him there gently. His whole body convulsed again and again, and I felt very sorry for a moment, for it seemed to me as though I were making him wring himself out, instead of doing it for him. I exerted myself, sucking hard, and he cried out so loudly that I feared the whole house might hear, deep in the earth as we were. I swallowed him down without a thought as he finished.

Uriah sank to the floor beside me. I could hear him gasping for breath, and I wished for a moment that he would never get it back, so much did I like having affected him.

“Who was your quarrel with, then?” Uriah asked at length, still a little breathless. “I can’t help a little curiosity, on that matter.”

“I shall tell you, if you first tell me how you came to know anything about winning a fight,” I replied.

“As you like, Master Copperfield,” he said, and I thought he did not seem very displeased, after all, to be asked a little more about himself. “My education was in a charitable sort of establishment. It ain’t where it was stood any longer, so you won’t ‘ave seen the boys in their sorry old uniforms, and how provoking the sight of ‘em was, to the others as wasn’t at school. One must be umble before one’s betters, they’d say at school, and they drubbed it right into us ard as they could. But they didn’t say anything about being umble before those other boys, those as weren’t being educated to be so decent and Godly, and weren’t like to be our betters. And I took them at their word.”

“I reckon you made those boys quite sorry they’d troubled you,” I said, “but you are not really humble to anybody, are you? Not really, in your heart.” This, I understood quite clearly now, and was glad of it. I had never liked his simpering, and I should not have been able to love him if he had respected his betters but been violent to his inferiors. 

Uriah sighed. “I’ll admit, to you, Copperfield, that I ain’t.” 

“That’s all right,” I said. “I like you better for it, anyhow.” 

He looked at me--for our eyes had at last grown enough accustomed to the dark, and searched my face. I think he believed me.

“And now for my half of the bargain,” said I. “It is the butcher’s boy who is my enemy. Would you help me to win my next fight with him, do you think?” 

“Master Copperfield,” he said, with a queer sort of grin, “If _you_ asked, I’d help you kill him.” 

I laughed, but in my heart I knew he more than half meant it in earnest. And, truth be told, though I hadn’t the slightest interest in the poor fellow’s murder, I didn’t entirely mind that Uriah should make the offer.


End file.
